http://www.blacksheepcreamery.com/

http://www.knowyourcheese.info/
A good communal site for cheese lovers.

New season, a fresh start

Out with the old and in with the new, we have cleared out the poorer performing ewes and aquired some new Friesian ewes, hopefully getting more milk from fewer sheep this year. They are strange looking animals, but I am sure they will become part of the family as time goes by. The ewes are joining at the moment to lamb in August this year. Plenty to do before then. The girls have been busy being famous, posing for pictures on the TV show 'Postcards', screened last week, and soon to be seen in the 'Weekly Times' paper.

Jacki the 'sheepdog'

Jacki came to us in November 09 as a 6 month well-grown pup, and is going thru the ropes of becoming a sheep dog. At the moment she is focusing on obedience lessons and an introduction to sheep but has a facination for guinea pigs. She does enjoy trips to the sheep paddock and getting about on the ute. She is short-haired Border Collie.

Shearing

Make way dairy, clear the board and sharpen the gear. "Sheep'o". We have finally got around to shearing time, a relief to all involved. A month too late really, with a few grass seeds getting into the wool now and the weather warming up. Now the ewes can be farmed off to fresh feed in the out paddock. The lambs will wait until later as their wool is still pretty short, and they are busy grazing clover and blackberries in Main Creek flats at Red Hill. Hopefully not too many berry thorns in the wool! Now for a couple of chiropractor visits to get the back straightened out; some of those sheep are bigger and stronger than me....Hopefully the wool check will fill the bar fridge again.

Season's end

Well at last the ewes have said 'no more milk' so we have dried the herd off and made the last wheels of pecorino and buckets of yoghurt. Playing with the sheep milk will be missed but it will be nice to be able to unchain ourselves from the dairy until next year. Some of the girls defied the trend and were determined to keep giving milk, and the maidens were still milking well but we convinced them to get with the program as we've got plans for Christmas! The good news is that there is a good store of pecorino in the cellar for everyone to enjoy over the summer. It has become distinctly nutty and smooth textured. So the next page is tackling shearing, make the ewes comfortable to summer over in the high country of Red Hill, and enjoy some prime lamb. The ewe lambs are starting to loose the wool around their East Friesian tails and promising to become good strong milkers in the years to come.

Discussion topic

When to wean?
Do you prefer to;
1. let ewes rear great lambs for a month then have what milk is left over,
2. Share half of each days milk, still get well grown lambs but put up with cranky sheep that don't let their milk down,
3. Wean shortly after birth, spend a lot on milk powder, get heaps of milk but risk stunted poddy lambs, or worse..?